Abstract:

This article pays tribute to Rudolf Bultmann as a scholar of faith who fulfilled the most
influential role in the interpretation of Jesus and the New Testament during the twentieth
century. In the article Bultmann’s leading publications are discussed against the background
of the question of which one has been the most significant. Three important publications
are identified, namely his book on the socio-cultural environment of the earliest followers
of Jesus in first-century Semitic-Hellenistic world, his book on the historical Jesus, and his
commentary on the Gospel of John. Various criteria are applied to value the significance of
these three publications. They are Bultmann’s understanding of what the scientific nature of
the theological discourse principally would entail; how modern-day believers could adhere
to an ancient mythological discourse; the way in which today a historical discourse could
existentially been engaged with and why Jesus of Nazareth would be regarded as theologically
significant. Both the depth of Bultmann’s understanding of the substance of the theological
discourse found in John’s gospel and the quality of Bultmann’s historical-critical analysis of
John’s gospel lead to the finding that this commentary should be considered to be not only the
most significant for the twentieth century but beyond that time even into the current phase of
biblical and theological interpretation.